Daybreakers is a vampire movie which owes its heritage to The Matrix and 28 Days Later equally. It’s not horror; it’s sci-fi with a bit of blood-sucking thrown in, before ultimately descending into action.
Ethan Hawke plays Edward (why Edward?), a vampire with the tendencies of Anne Rice’s Loius who has a real problem with the human red stuff. Instead, just like Angel, he favours pigs’ blood.
But Edward’s problems don’t end there. He works for this Vampire Big Business in the haematology department, trying to create a synthetic substitute because there are like, 20 humans left or something. I’m still not sure why they weren’t breeding the remaining few. Instead they seem to hook them up in cells: all very Matrix-y. Anyway, Edward falls in with the Human Resistance, who have discovered a cure for growing fangs.
I admit, I quite enjoyed this film. Sure, the plot has some yawning craters, but it looks stylish, almost neo-noir in places. You can guess mostly where it’s going to end up, but it looks pretty along the way.
It’s got some great touches - the newspaper headings about the pandemic and how vampire society seems to be mainly a load of white collars. Plus it’s got Willen Dafoe in it. What more could you want?
Not so hot are the almost painfully obvious parallels it’s trying to draw with current issues - genocide, oil shortages, blah blah blah. But I’m a sucker for vampire films (BOOM BOOM) and Daybreakers does the trick without giving us the wow factor.
Stylish fangs with no bite; but who cares?
Ethan Hawke plays Edward (why Edward?), a vampire with the tendencies of Anne Rice’s Loius who has a real problem with the human red stuff. Instead, just like Angel, he favours pigs’ blood.
But Edward’s problems don’t end there. He works for this Vampire Big Business in the haematology department, trying to create a synthetic substitute because there are like, 20 humans left or something. I’m still not sure why they weren’t breeding the remaining few. Instead they seem to hook them up in cells: all very Matrix-y. Anyway, Edward falls in with the Human Resistance, who have discovered a cure for growing fangs.
I admit, I quite enjoyed this film. Sure, the plot has some yawning craters, but it looks stylish, almost neo-noir in places. You can guess mostly where it’s going to end up, but it looks pretty along the way.
It’s got some great touches - the newspaper headings about the pandemic and how vampire society seems to be mainly a load of white collars. Plus it’s got Willen Dafoe in it. What more could you want?
Not so hot are the almost painfully obvious parallels it’s trying to draw with current issues - genocide, oil shortages, blah blah blah. But I’m a sucker for vampire films (BOOM BOOM) and Daybreakers does the trick without giving us the wow factor.
Stylish fangs with no bite; but who cares?
